“It is often asked—Do you believe in Prophecies and Miracles? Yes and no, one may answer; that depends. In general, yes; doubtless we believe in them, and are not of the number of those who ‘pique themselves,’ as Fénelon said, ‘on rejecting as fables, without examination, all the wonders that God works.’ But if you come to the particular, and say—Do you believe in such a revelation, such an apparition, such a cure?—here it is that it behoves us not to forget the rules of Christian prudence, nor the warnings of Holy Writ, nor the teaching of Theologians and Saints, nor, finally, the decrees of Councils, and the motives of those decrees. Has the proper Authority spoken? If it has spoken, let us bow with all the respect due to grave and mature ecclesiastical judgments, even where they are not clothed with infallible authority; if it has not spoken, let us not be of those who reject everything in a partizan spirit, and want to impose this unbelief upon everybody; nor of those who admit everything lightly, and want alike to impose their belief; let us be careful in discussing a particular fact, not to reject the very principle of the Supernatural, but neither let us shut our eyes to the evidence of testimony; let us be prudent, even to the most careful scrutiny—the subject-matter requires it, the Scriptures recommend it—but let us not be sceptics; let us be sincere, but not fanatical: that is the true mean. And let us not forget that most often the safest way in these matters is not to hurry one’s judgment, not to decide sharply and affirm absolutely—in a word, not to anticipate, in one sense or the other, the judgment of those whose place and mission it is to examine herein; but to await, in the simplicity of faith and of Christian wisdom, a decision which marks out a wise rule, although not always with absolute certainty.”—Dupanloup, Bishop of Orleans, “On Contemporary Prophecies.”
Genre: RELIGION / General| Language | Status |
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Portuguese
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Already translated.
Translated by Flávia Tróglio
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Spanish
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Already translated.
Translated by Cecilia Duarte
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